The impact of attendance in supplemental educational services on students' academic achievement

This dissertation explores the attendance trends within NCLB’s Supplemental Educational Services (SES). With reauthorization of NCLB on the horizon, knowing as much as possible about NCLB policies is vital to future decision making. Because current SES research tends to focus more on the effects SES has on academic achievement without attention to student attendance within SES, results of such studies could be questioned. Current SES enrollment practices register a student for SES and thus the student is a participant in SES. No distinction is made between students who enroll and never attend SES tutoring and those who enroll and fully complete programs. This study utilized a data set from Virginia Department of Education of students enrolled in SES during school years 2006-2009 and conducted quantitative analysis of student achievement in relation to the number of SES hours they attended. This study concludes with future research suggestions within SES to better inform policy makers.